Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song (1971)

User Rating:

5.5/10   

Director:

Melvin Van Peebles

Writer:

Melvin Van Peebles (written by)

Release Date:

23 October 1993 (Japan)

Genre:

Crime | Drama | Thriller

Tagline:

The Film that THE MAN doesn't want you to see!

Plot:

After saving a Black Panther from some racist cops, a black prostitute goes on the run from "the man" with the help of the ghetto community and some disillusioned Hells Angels.

Plot Keywords:

Black Man | Run | On The Run | Hell's Angels | Police

Cast

Simon Chuckster	...	Beetle
Melvin Van Peebles	...	Sweetback
Hubert Scales	...	Mu-Mu
John Dullaghan	...	Commissioner
West Gale
Niva Rochelle
Rhetta Hughes	...	Old Girl Friend
Nick Ferrari
Ed Rue
John Amos	...	Biker (as Johnny Amos)
Lavelle Roby
Ted Hayden
Mario Van Peebles	...	Young Sweetback / Kid (as Mario Peebles)
Sonja Dunson
Michael Augustus

Runtime:

97 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono

Certification:

USA:R (1974) | USA:X (1971) | Canada:(Banned) (Nova Scotia) | New Zealand:R18 | UK:18 | Canada:R

Filming Locations:

Los Angeles, California, USA

Company:

Yeah

Trivia:

Top-grossing independent movie of 1972.

Movie Connections:

Referenced in The Story Behind Baadasssss!: The Birth of Black Cinema (2004) (V)

From Another Era

This movie, when first watched by people from my generation (Gen X), doesn't seem to be very coherent. Something strange and psychedelic from a weird era. However, if you watch this movie and then watch How to Get the Man's Foot Outta Your Ass, which is a movie about making Sweet Sweetback, you'll see why this was so damn revolutionary. This was the first time Black America told White America on screen that the days of "kissing up to Shirley Temple's ass" were over. It was a political movie about Black America and even Minority America being tired of whiteness, as well as stating that Black America now has its own identity and society. It took some pretty strong courage to make this move when you consider the time frame that it came out in; the early seventies, a period that saw a shift from "I have a dream" to "By any means necessary." I believe this film opened the doors to allow black artistic media to be critical about white America, society, politics and corruption that generally would have been censored before. Sometimes I wonder if this helped pave the way for people like Richard Pryor, Eddie Murphy and even Dave Chapelle. My father, a white man, told me that when he went to see this film back in 1971, the audience screamed and cheered during the opening scene when across the screen it read to "all the Brothers and Sisters who are tired of being held down by the Man." Nowadays people wouldn't really respond to that, not even black society I don't think, but back then it could have gotten you lynched, even in 1971. So when people screamed and cheered in the movie theater when they saw this, I think you can imagine how important a film like this must be in film history. No minority had ever dared to say that on the silver screen before.